Our first stop was at The Northern Great Lakes Visitor
Center, located on the northern edge of the Chequamegon-Nicolet National
Forest, near Ashland WI. This is a
really awesome building that was originally designated a National Children’s
Forest and is staffed by National Park Service employees who provide detailed
information about the Lake Superior Region.
There are two theaters, murals and exhibits to illustrate
the heritage and history of the Lake Superior Region. Outdoors there are boardwalk trails that wind
through swamps and meadows. They have
lots of brochures and information on all sorts of activities.
We spent the night at an RV park in Bayfield WI. At the tip of the Bayfield Peninsula in Lake
Superior are the Apostle Islands. We took
a ferry out to the largest island – Madeline Island and the town of
LaPoint. There really isn’t much
there…it’s a touristy town. We wanted to
find the bank where my mom worked about 30 years ago.
When we left Bayfield we headed towards Two Harbors MN. Along the way we made a stop at the Visitors
Center in Superior WI. I had found a
form online to become an “Admiral of the Lake”.
I printed out the form and had to get it stamped at each of the 5 Lake
Superior Travel Regions around the lake.
We were able to get it stamped at the visitor’s center plus we picked up
an arm load of brochures. 
We decided to drive back to Duluth after we got the trailer
set up at the park in Two Harbors. We
drove down to the waterfront in Duluth to see the Aerial Lift Bridge and take a
walk out to the lighthouse. We had lunch
at “Grandma’s Restaurant”- nice place and good food. The atmosphere is
nostalgic/eclectic. It is also home of Grandma’s Marathon. This marathon is the 13th largest
in the United States with over 17,000 participants. We were glad we went to
Duluth when we did because the next day it poured and was very foggy. The
Marathon started about ½ mile NE of where we were camped and was going to start
on Saturday, so we left the campsite on Friday to avoid the mass of people.
Duluth was also the birth place of Bob Dylan. While in Two Harbors we drove out to
Gooseberry Falls. There are a series of
5 waterfalls within about a quarter mile down the river. We actually hiked
about 2 miles – We could hike down one side of the river, cross a bridge and
then hike back up the hill on the other side.
We were on the “other side” as far as we could be from the visitor’s
center when it opened up and poured. Good thing we had rain ponchos in the
backpack.
Our next stop was Thunder Bay, Ontario. We started doing a
Canadian Heritage series of Geocaches that took us to places where we learned
about people and places that made Ontario what it is today. Several multi-caches
and zigzagging all across Thunder Bay was quite interesting. We also drove to
Kakabeka Falls there was some serious water flowing here. The largest falls
volume-wise west of Niagara Falls.
We next drove a short distance to Sleeping
Giant Provincial Park just north of Thunder Bay. Most Canadian Provincial Parks are very basic
and rustic- usually only electric and sometimes water. They also came with swarms of mosquitos. We drove
a winding narrow, less travelled gravel road to some of the tallest cliffs in
Ontario - about 650 feet above Lake Superior to Thunder Bay Lookout. The view
that day was clear and very awesome. We actually saw a black bear by the side
of the road. After the lookout, we drove
to the other end of the Peninsula to the fishing village of Silver Isle. What was there was old and quaint. Then the wind, fog and rain started to move
in…it made us feel like we at the ocean instead of a “lake”.
We decided to leave the fog and mosquitos
of Sleeping Giant a day early and headed out to the middle of nowhere. We hadn’t made reservations and that can be
sort dicey in the Canadian Wilderness- particularly since we wanted at least
electricity and water. There aren’t many
private campgrounds in Canada- most people stay at the parks-and even most private
parks don’t have water and sewer. The
only campground recommendations we got were for Ney’s Lunch and Campground –
across the highway from Neys Provincial Park and 20+ miles west of a small town
named Marathon. We played golf a couple
of times on their 9 hole course. We were
there for Canada Day so we went into the little town of Marathon and watched
teams of 8 pull this very large Ontario Provincial Police (O.P.P) Command
vehicle. It was a timed event and they had to pull the vehicle about 20 feet. Interesting watching how the locals interacted
amongst themselves.
On July 2nd we decided to finish
the Canadian section of the Circle tour and head for Sault Ste Marie, Michigan. We stopped at a visitor’s center in a place
called Wawa Ontario – mainly to see the huge metal goose that it is famous
for. We wandered around the grounds for
a while and ventured into the woods to find a geocache…mosquitos are almost deadly
there. There were several great
viewpoints of Lake Superior, but some are very hard to stop at when you are
towing a travel trailer.
Arriving at Sault Ste Marie was a welcome
relief…we were able to use our cell phones and iPad again and to have decent Wi-Fi
service…we are certainly spoiled.
The Ship Wreck Museum is a fascinating place. We were able to watch a video of the recovery
of the bell from the Edmunds Fitzgerald and to talk to a diver that was there
and who had done a lot diving at different ship wrecks. The wreck of the Edmunds Fitzgerald happened
while I still lived in Wisconsin and was in the news for a long time. It was interesting to see all the
displays. We also saw the rescue equipment
that had been used for ships and people.
This equipment was explained in detail to us and it was amazing that
over 50,000 people had been rescued over the years.
We were in Sault Ste Marie over the 4th
of July. We watched the parade and were
able to view the fireworks from our campground.
Before we left town, we stopped the locks visitor’s center and watched
the ships going through the locks – including a huge Coast Guard ship.
It was a great trip around the lake…even
though we had fog, rain and mosquitos.
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